"When the Giants Come to Town..." is my blog intended to chronicle my thoughts on San Francisco Giants baseball. My special interest is in prospects and the farm system, but of course, will comment on all aspects of the San Francisco Giants. I will also comment on baseball in general, particularly from a fantasy baseball perspective. I hope you will find the site informative, and invite you to join in the discussion.

Wednesday, February 21, 2018

DrB's 2018 Giants Top 50 Prospects: #3 Steven Duggar

If you are wondering what happened to #4, Bryan Reynolds was traded to the Pirates for Andrew McCutchen after the Top 50 list was finalized.

After hitting .321 in 276 PA for AA Richmond in his first full pro season in 2016, some of us thought Steven Duggar might challenge for a MLB role in 2017. Alas, he started the season on the DL with an injured quad. Then, during his short stint in Sacramento and later in an AFL assignment, he drew rave reviews for his CF defense. Guess what? The Giants desperately need an upgrade in their CF defense and so far have not found it outside the organization in the Hot Stove League. Fangraphs rates him as having 60 speed and a 60 arm, but 40 field. If he's upgraded the field part to match his speed, well, you could have yourself a MLB CF there. If he could give the Giants 60 D in CF, I think they could live with a bit of a learning curve on offense, not that he necessarily needs that either. So, big spring for Steven Duggar. By all accounts he has a chance to win the starting CF job in spring training. Even if he doesn't, the alternatives seem to be little more than placeholders until he's fully ready, probably within a couple of months.

12 comments:

As for Duggar, I don't really get FanGraphs rankings or FV projection. 60 Arm, 60 Speed yet 40 defense? And that while he played RF in college (arm) he was excellent when he has played CF. So while I can sort of buy off on their 30 power if all you did was look at college and AA, I firmly don't buy off on 40 defense or 40 FV.

"The Giants had Duggar make an adjustment in the angle of his barrel so it wouldn't point toward the ground, which gave him a flatter and longer left-handed stroke and helped him see pitches better. He started hammering pitches he used to foul off and did a better job of coping with breaking balls. After translating his impressive raw power into just eight homers in three college seasons, he went deep 10 times last year, and he displayed his plate discipline by leading San Francisco farmhands with 72 walks.

Duggar can clock plus-plus running times but his speed doesn't play quite that fast. He should be a more prolific and successful base stealer, but he was caught 14 times in 29 attempts in 2016. He spent most of his college career in right field, in part because he has a strong arm, but played quality defense when he got extensive time in center last year."

Personally I think he has some power and I think MLB's power grade is truer, though like all lefties, AT&T will punish him hard.

An interesting thing about Bonds: when he came to SF (1993), he immediately began not just to hit more HRs, but he began hitting more HRs than doubles. In Pittsburg his HR:2B was 176:220; in SF it was 586:381! In only one year, 1998, did he hit more doubles than HRs, and only once as a Pirate was it more HRs. It wasn't that he was turning doubles into HRs, they were sort of constant, he just hit more HRs.

Suddenly, with RHB Longoria (for years), Mc,Cutchen, and trading of Span, the giant (pun intended) overbalance toward LHB is G-O-N-E unless Parker, Duggar, Ryder, and the ineffective as a RHB Sandoval become the bench.Kelby, Hundley, Jackson, Sandoval probably, Hernandez maybe -- not many slots left!And the schedule is not the Giants friend: 3 days off in the first 28 days! Aren't 13 pitchers a must with only 3 proven starters?Then there's Mac -- for years his RH bat might have been an advantage but now, er, well, not so much.A little early to determine the 25-man roster, but the holes are few and the bodies many, and there's no bias toward RHB this year.

I always resented the fact that Babe Ruth had that short porch in Yankee Stadium his entire career, and that Hank Aaron had Fulton County Stadium for the latter part of his career, while Wilie Mays played most of his career in a wind tunnel blowing to his opposite field.

If you want to see a stat line that will blow your mind, look up Barry Bonds 1993, his first year in SF.

I think any analysis that focused too much on Duggar's prior stats will be undervaluing what he can do.

In The Athletic interview with Duggar, he noted that he used to use a V-swing before, and changed it after Salem-Keizer. It is probably similar to how Belt was changed by the Giants. Both hit for a lot more power after the changes.

Then last season, he worked with Vince Coleman on stealing, and his steals success percentage was day and night between prior and 2017. He was elite last season, marginal before, to the point where stealing was not adding value.

And defense, most reports I've seen says that he has good CF defense, so a 40 for Fielding don't pass the smell test. Not sure why they did that, unless they are penalizing him for how he played CF earlier in his career, when he was learning how to play there, and not accounting for his learning curve.

Isn't there "value" for the Giants to keep Duggar in Sacramento until a certain date so he doesn't become a "super 2" and eligible for arbitration a year sooner? Of course, if he's Belt-ing the ball in ST and/or the Giants think they need him from Game 1, super-2 might not be a consideration.Without an injury to an OFer, his chances are slim with "slots" being few and options being many. Plus, with the heavy play schedule and the uncertainty of the Giants pitching past 3 starters and maybe 4 relievers, it suggests a full complement of arms.

One of the most important Giants prospects in recent memory with a wide variety of outcomes. If he were the Brandon Crawford of CF prospects the Giants outlook for contention over the next 5 years changes dramatically.

About Me

I grew up in Northern California near the Napa Valley. I got interested in baseball and the Giants by listening to Russ Hodges and Lon Simmons broadcast Giants games on KSFO. My early heros were Willie Mays, Willie McCovey, Juan Marichal and a guy you don't always think of, Jim Ray Hart. When I got older and was in school and early career, I didn't have time to follow as closely, but I tried to look up their boxscores each day and catch an occasional game on TV. One habit I got into at an early age was looking up the stats of their minor league players in The Sporting News. That became more difficult as TSN moved away from comprehensive baseball coverage. Now, of course, technology and affluence has changed all that. The internet is teaming with farm system/minor league information as well as college and high school baseball. Satellite TV enables me to get most of the Giants games on TV. I'm married with 2 wonderful daughters, who like to watch games with me.